Is your company Green?

I don't think mine is.

It finally really hit me today while riding the train into the office. There was an article in the NYT about Mayor Bloomberg calling for a reduction in CO2 emissions from NYC buildings. Apparently, 79% of all CO2 emissions in NYC come from buildings as opposed to the national average of 32%. NYC has a relatively low carbon imprint based on density, smallness of the apartments and the fact that the public transportation is so good. But this really got me thinking that it's time for me to do something at work.

Here's what has kept me from acting earlier(no excuses though)...I've been working for this large ad agency for almost a year and a half with a little 3 month hiatus during that time. I'm considered a temporary employee and therefore I don't feel I have the same voice as if I was a full-time employee and a little worried about ruffling someones feathers the wrong way and ending up on a permanent hiatus. Anyway...I've noticed they have no policies that I know of for recycling paper, plastic, glass or aluminum. I'm going to find out what the official policy is first then start trying to make some changes and get a decent recycling policy instituted. The amount of paper that gets wasted here alone is a crime! And many floors have free sodas for employees to drink but there is no recycling bins for the empty cans. The used to have bottles of water but thankfully most of those are gone and replace with filtered water dispensers on each floor. Then of course there is energy use. I know the area where I work is pretty much buzzing wit equipment powered on all time 24/7 even over the weekend. The lights are on timers to go off at 11pm however.

So here I was thinking about all this stuff on my way from getting off the train and walking to the office and what did I see? This...





Now I'm not sure whether this came from my company but it got my blood boiling. All this plastic, CRTs, mercury all being dumped and carted off to god knows where. The iMac looked completely intact while some of the other CPUs and monitors had been gutted. Bottom line... there's a correct way of disposing of these types of material and this isn't one of them. Apple has a recycling program and with the number of computers this company must buy from them certainly sending them back to Apple is an option. Don't know if I can find out where it came from but there were copies of Adweek in the bins also so my guess is ad agency. Just don't know if there are others in the area.

So here I go on my mission. I'm going to start slowly but be persistent. I will of course report my progress. Wish me luck!

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green, recycle, apple